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Here's a selection of books for stitchers, needleworkers, and surface designers. Addresses are provided for m,ail orders. Designers Diana de Marly's Worth: Father of Haute Couture (Holmes & Meier Pub., 30 Irving Place, New York, revised ed.; softcover, $24.95; 238 pp.) is an engaging and detailed book about how Englishman Charles Frederick Worth worked his way up from fabric clerk in a Paris firm to premier couture designer in Europe, under the patronage of Empress Eugenie. Many black and NY 10003; 1990, accompany descriptions of Worth's innovations, which set precedents for the operation of couture houses today. De Marly's book is a history of costume silhouettes, as well as a biography of a man, and is recommended reading for anyone interested in costume history or the development of the couture business. To many, the name Pucci invokes whit↋ photos only images of swirling psychedelic colors. But as Shirley Kennedy points out in Pucci: A Rena (Abbeville Press, 488 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10022; 1991; hardcover, $75; 214 pp.) Emilio Pucci was one of very few designers besides Coco Chanel who turned away from the restricting Dior Look to create clothes that women loved to live in. American women snatched up Pucci's lightweight, wrinklefree silk jersey dresses and were immediate converts to the comfort of his tailored multi color silk shirts worn over tight-fitting Capri pants or colorful opaque hose. Pucci fans will love this book, which is packed with color photos of designs, fabrics, and even Pucci collectors surrounded by their prizes. A successful business creates its own issance in Fashion vicious cycle: The more successful you are, the more people you need, the more products you must make. Life for a designer these days leaves little time to create. How treacherous, frantic, yet seductive the fashion designer's life can be is explored by Irene Daria in The Fashion Cycle (Simon & Schuster, 200 Old Tappan 1990; hardcover, $21.95; 240 pp.), a chronological look at a year in the business lives of five designers-Bill Blass, Liz Claiborne, Donna Karan, Arnold Scaasi, and Adrienne Vittadini. We see rude and noisy fashion reporters suddenly become polite at Scaasi's couture shows after Barbara Bush selects a Scaasi to wear to the inaugural ball. Donna Karan, putting Rd., Old Tappan, NJ 07675; 90 aside her own neck brace, advises a customer on how to make a brace fashionable. Liz Claiborne goes through the painful process of training others to her multimillion dollar company as she eases into retirement. This is a fascinating book for anyone who wonders what being a designer is really like. If time is short, and your priorities are to make professional-looking, attractive, and versatile clothes as quickly as you can, Sandra Betzina's basic sewing book Power Sewing: New Ways Sewi Fine Clothes Fast (Power Sewing, 185 Fifth Ave., San Francisco, CA 94118; 1985; softcover, $16.95; 255 pp.) and the advanced More Power Sewing: Masters' Techniques for the 21st Cen tury to Make (1990; softcover, $19.95; 272 pp.) are valuable investments. Power Sewing goes straight to the core of contemporary sewing techniques; pattern selection, adjustment, and fitting; threads and needles; and perfecting seams, sleeves, closures, pants, pockets, and more. More Power Sewing is a collection of designer and advanced techniques including working with special fabrics (knits, leather, synthetic suedes), embellishing with beads and trim, tailored jackets, revamping your wardrobe, and making a travel wardrobe. Quick now: What is vegetable ivory and how do you distinguish it from real ivory or Bakelite? Marilyn Green answers this question and offers a plethora of practical button advice in her witty book The Button Lover's Book (Chilton Book Company, 1 Chilton Way, Radnor, PA 19089; 1991; softcover, $17.95; 182 pp.). Chapters on collecting, sorting and storing, history, creative uses on clothing, m jewelry/toys/games, and foolproof sewing are interspersed with the quaint, odd, button facts and the author's cartoons. The 17 pages of museum and mail-order sources alone are worth the book price. Jane Asher's Cos aking buttons, button Chain Pub., PO Box 2634-100, Menlo Park, CA 94026; 1991; softcover, $22; 142 pp.) is useful for both children and adults. Inside this wacky book are instructions and gridded patterns for a hundred costumes, flavored with British humor and some quite funky (a jellyfish made of bubble plastic). Asher suggests inexpensive matelials whenever possible and has kept the sewing skills required to a minimum. tume Book (Open run broi↋凹㭨၀ Em aml netting Sashiko: Blue and White Quilt Japan, by designer Kazuko Mende and dyer/embroiderer Reiko Morishige (Kodansha Inti., do Putnam Pub. Group, 390 M ng, button↋凹 aml costumes 07073; 1991; hardcover, $39.95; 120 pp.) concentrates on the Japanese embroidery's potential as an artistic medium. The authors achieve this by urra jm..'taposing gorgeous photos of their own mesmerizing and contemporary work with those of design sources covered with traditional patterns, including beautiful kimono, ceramics, blockprints, and textiles. The text, interspersed with the photos, starts with a chapter on historical Japanese pattern development, then continues with the meaning, variation, and manipulation of patterns. The Splicing and RopewoIk, written in 1953 by Hervey Garrett Smith (Dover Publications, 31 East 2nd St., Mineola, Arts of the Sailor: Kno ttin↋ between a knot, a hitch, a bend, and a splice. Several of the methods shown to whip a cord would make unusual finishing touches for decorative garment cord. Also included are decorative knots; ornamental coverings and netting; and techniques for sewing ditty bags and buckets from canvas. My favorite project is the Flemish coil rope mat. difference Textiles The Victoria and Albert Museum in London opens the doors of its Indian tiedye textile collection with an extremely beautiful and scholarly book, Tie-dyed T and Rosemary Crill; Rizzoli IntI. Pub., 300 Park Ave., New York, exti↋es of hardcover, $45; 206 pp.). Two-thirds of the book discusses regional patterns from Gujurat, Rajasthan, Pakistan and Panjab, and South India, with page after page of full-color photos of amazing plaids, stripes, and contrasting dot designs of people and animals. Rosemary Crill's research of the origins of the Western spotted bandana in the last third of the book is good detective-story reading. India (by Veronica Murphy NY 10010; 1991; -Amy T. Yanagi Amy T. Yanagi is m,anaging editor of Threads. Thread↋ Maga↋ , 11501; 1990; softcover, $6.95; 233 pp.) is an informative book even for those who sail only on the Sea of Terra Firma. After a brief introduction to basic rope structure and fibers, we learn the NY Art of y Hill Pkwy., E. Rutherford, NJ , knotting ine